Stash Tea

This black tea is a little plant-like, but not bad. It’s from a past TTB. It does decently with some sugar and milk. I expect an assam to be bolder, but maybe this batch is old.

I think I expected this to be a little more tart and juicy raspberry, but honestly for a tea bag cut it was still pretty flavourful and definitely evocative of its name. Nothing fancy/high quality, but nothing to turn your nose up at either – especially for the cost and convenience.

I like to believe that there’s a way to make every tea into something you can enjoy, no matter how unimpressed you are when you steep it as directed. Maybe that’s just because I can’t bear to throw away tea when I know that I’ve spent (mumbles) on the collection.

Anyway, I couldn’t get this to a point where I was enjoying it steeped in a mug, so I made the rest of the bags into a concentrated chai syrup with a little sugar. Delicious chai latte this morning! The dominant flavors are still cinnamon and clove, but the ginger did come through a little more clearly, and the milk helps balance those strong spice flavors.

I’m not much of a black tea lover, so most chais are all about the spices for me. And a good chai is such a treat, but this one isn’t quite there. I’ve tried it several ways (different number of tea bags, different amount of water, various temperatures, milk and no milk) but I just can’t seem to draw out more than clove and cinnamon from this one. There’s also not a lot of heat in the spice blend — maybe a little from the ginger, but I agree with the review that mentioned peppercorns: some black pepper would go a long way in this tea.

I’m a little bummed, because it’s not like I expect Stash to be top-shelf tea, but I do feel that I usually get a solid cup from them. I’m not sure I’ll finish this box. Ah well. Some nights were just meant for hot chocolate instead, right?

Okay, hear me out: this tea plus pineapple-flavored sparkling water over ice.

I steeped two bags in half a cup of water, then added it to large glass mug with a big handful of ice cubes and most of the can of sparkling water. It was fa-bu-lous. The pineapple flavor from the sparking water rounds out the tart finish of the tea itself by adding a little extra sweetness.

I know a lot of tea enthusiasts aren’t crazy about the hibiscus that’s in so many tart blends. If that’s you and you have some of this tea kicking around… I’m serious: pineapple sparkling water.

Does anyone else think the dry teabags smell exactly like Country Time instant lemonade powder? When I was a child, my parents’ church would have coffee and lemonade in the entryway after the service on Sunday mornings, and they used that mix for the lemonade. This took me right back.

You know, some teas give you exactly what they say they will. The citric acid and hibiscus make this a tart, almost mouth-puckering tea, but the lemongrass mellows it out a little and the lemon flavor is there. I’m not amazed by this tea, but I’ll get through the box happily enough.

TTB tea. This is my first time trying Stash’s loose leaf collection. I’m surprised by how much I’m enjoying this! The cherry and almond combine so smoothly. The black tea base doesn’t show up too much. It actually ends up being quite a light tasting tea, almost as if it didn’t have that black base at all. My partner found the cherry flavor to be too fake, but I didn’t mind.

Review from May 2022

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Yep, that’s a chai! It’s got all the typical spices and a good amount of flavour. As always, I drank this with some vanilla soy milk and a tiny bit of sugar (~1/2 tsp). Nice cinnamon and warm peppery spices but balanced out by the clove and cardamom. Nothing particularly exceptional about this blend, but it is an enjoyable cup. Best with milk to round out the CTC black base, which can be a bit overly tannic and tending towards bitter.

Due to overexposure as a kid on the farm, I have a long-standing aversion to raw cucumbers and canteloupe, simply because they stunk up everything else in the fridge. But thanks to a kind donor (I’m sorry, I don’t know which of you lovely folks shared this), I can at least slightly revise my melon aversion. I fridge-steeped this overnight. The green tea was a nice counterpoint to the authentic melon flavor. Cool and pleasant.

Teabag from a TTB. I taste some low quality cinnamon. It’s okay? It’s a pretty boring one-note chai. It was better warm. After going in the fridge, it became quite plain.

My lovely coworker had this tea and I thought why not? There was a strong fruity smell when I opened the wee foil which did translate to the taste. I was fully expecting astringency and/or bitter but the base turned out to be incredibly smooth.

Loved this tea growing up, it must have been one of the first teas I’ve ever had. Just finished a box a bought on a whim a while back, and in order to finish the box I have been using these bags to make crazy delicious lattes. I am quite fortunate to have access to an espresso machine throughout my life, thanks to working in foodservice for almost 15yrs and having a partner in the coffee industry. Espresso machines aren’t too expensive, if you know where to look and are into finding ways to get your latte fix in. The past week or so I’ve been petsitting for a couple who have a really nice Breville machine, and i have been going ham on it every morning, making myself as many tea lattes as I can drink. figured I would use this review to put my recipe.

MiepSteep’s Tea Latte
This recipe is for those who have access to an espresso machine btw
I typically use the smallest filter basket in the portafilter if possible, since you wont need too much tea… relatively. It’s very important to flush out the group head and wash out the portafilter before adding tea to the portafilter basket, so no lingering coffee smells taint the brew. Basically, all I do is rip open 3-4 teabags and empty the contents into the portafilter. No need to use a tamper to squish it down, since the leaves will do some minimal expanding as the shots are pulled. I have also used other types of tea, like rooibos (the messiest), honeybush, CTC, and spices. I’ve also been using T2’s Melbourne and New York Breakfast for lattes this week as well.Have yet to use green tea, maybe I’ll try that this week!

The idea is to make a concentrate. After filling the portafilter basket with leaf fannings or what have you, either pull for twice as long as you would for an espresso shot (around 10-15seconds) or if your machine has a 1shot/2shot button like the Breville does, pull the equivalent of 5 shots into your cup. Steam some milk of choice in there and enjoy! Tastes just like a cookie to me :)

This was back-to-back with some nice Alishan loose leaf, how does a flavored and bagged tea fair?

Quite a strong white peach nose, probably some guava in there, caramelized sugar.

Now, granted my bags are probably expired at this point since they have been sitting around for ages, but this one falls really flat. The cooler it gets, the more I taste a little of the profile. It’s pretty subtle, but I covered that in my previous review. I guess I just thought there might be more flavor with hotter water to start.

Dropped a couple points as I would rather drink this iced or cold-brewed.

Edit: I threw some ice cubes into this one and it’s much better. I think there just isn’t a lot of flavor when it is hot so the little that comes through is available at low temperatures.

This bag has no right being as good as it ended up. I cold brewed overnight, using two bags in a 16oz mug, probably 10 hours? I figured it was tossable as these bags are out of date range I’m sure.

The tea ended up a nice peachy gold, and while I’m not pulling a lot of peach flavor out of it on tongue, the smell is definitely there from the flavoring used.

See, when I first read this bag I misunderstood; I thought it was peach white tea, not white peach Oolong tea.
So, in this iteration the flavors are light and bright with a little kiss of fruit sweetness on the finish. Maybe I could have gotten a bit more flavor by starting with warm water (I went with room temp to cold brew) but I also don’t care that much. This turned into a mellow morning refresher with little to no effort on my time. It’s a bit above average, or at least I would much rather drink this than Lipton…

I like to add flavoring syrups and milk to my bagged chamomile tea, and this one works as well for that as any! Plain, it was a bit flatter than some alternatives, but dressed up, it’s decent enough both warm and cold. It definitely didn’t taste high quality or flavorful without the help.

I slipped on the floor at PetSmart today on a catfood run and managed to sprain both my right ankle and right wrist. Not recommended.

Only now realized I hadn’t written a note for this yet, and I’m on the last teabag. I have been looking for a good black licorice tasting herbal, but this isn’t that. That said, I do really like it… It’s strongly sweet licorice root which I know is a polarizing flavor, but I enjoy it. The spice is gentle and the sweetness is nice for an evening sweet fix. I’ll likely grab this again sometime as I like quick and easy herbal teabags in the evening.

A tea from Advent calendar from Devon and with flavour of my favorite cake, that counts…

But, sadly, it was just robust black tea with little cacao notes and sadly no cherry nor vanilla here.

I don’t even see it on their website? It’s discontinued blend?

My office tea yesterday thanks to Devon and her advent calendar.

I have to say I am not much impressed about this one. It was quite clove-heavy with cinnamon whispering. And base black tea was somehow tannic water, without much to write home about.

I have been expecting more spices and overall more spicy cup for a chai.

Yay, the last one! \o/

This is a nice one. The spearmint and cinnamon are well-balanced. I don’t really get much orange, vanilla, or clove, but I’m not missing them. I’m a spearmint fan so this is right up my alley. It’s a nice, mellow spearmint tisane with the sweet cinnamon adding a festive touch. I could totally imagine sipping this on Christmas Eve!

Glad to be ending on a high note. And now I have to decide where to put all of these boxes of teabags! :|

Holiday grocery store teas tried: 19/19

Sipdown! (17)

Polished off another of my oldest teas! This was actually a gift from my mom, she sweetly sent me a set of Stash’s holiday collection (in January of 2022) after I complained that no stores near me seemed to carry holiday teas. This was the last tea from that box!

This was a very pleasant infusion, especially since I don’t generally like chocolate teas, and lavender is iffy. Mostly this is mint though, with lavender as a sidekick and a bit of creamy cocoa in the background. Not something I would repurchase, though I don’t tend to buy teabags in general. But mostly because I would rather blend my own version at this point.

Not gonna lie, was pretty much dreading this one. I tend to dislike both chocolate and lavender teas, and this has both.

But actually it’s quite good?! Mostly I taste peppermint supplemented by lavender, which is a nice enough combination. The lavender is mellow enough that it doesn’t taste like soap to me. I do get a bit of the chocolate flavor, but mostly it’s a creamy milk chocolaty taste from the cacao shells and the vanilla.

Pretty good for a chocolate-mint tisane, and the peppermint seems like it’s good quality – fresh and clean without tasting like a wet rag. The addition of the lavender keeps it interesting with an almost savory edge. Pleasantly surprised!

Holiday grocery store teas tried: 13/19

Sipdown! (11 | 166)

This tea was just not great. There’s basically zero evidence of white tea IMO, it mostly just tastes like a peppermint wet rag, and I feel like the earthiness of the ginger is only exacerbating that wet rag quality. There is a slight tingle of ginger warmth on the tongue.

Kind of annoyed that I had to order from the Stash website to get this, since it’s apparently an online exclusive. At least I got some cute mugs in that order LOL. :P

Sigh.

So I made an order from the Stash website specifically for this tea, because it’s apparently a website exclusive. And I like mint and white tea so it seemed right up my alley.

Welp, for a tea called “White Christmas”, I sure don’t taste much white tea in here. The peppermint leaf completely takes over the blend. It might as well be a plain peppermint tisane, because that’s mostly what I taste. I do get a touch of earthy ginger heat on the backend, but mostly it’s herbaceous peppermint that leans a big wet rag-ish.

I mean, I’ll drink through it as a bedtime tea, but I was so excited for it. Sad panda. At least I got a couple of cute holiday mugs in that order… :P

Holiday grocery store teas tried: 12/19

This one’s a bit of an oddball as far as holiday teas go. There’s nothing really holiday-ish about it, their thought process seems to be that you need caffeine on Christmas morning? A bit of a reach, lol.

Anyway, it’s fine. If I’m honest, I’m not smelling or tasting the jasmine at all. It mostly tastes like a breakfast blend, which is essentially what it is. Not too strong or tannic, which is nice, but there’s not a lot going on either. Some bready, malty notes maybe. But otherwise it’s mostly tea-ish.

It’s all fine and drinkable, but basically just a breakfast blend, and not a very interesting one at that. Another one for rehoming, as I can’t see myself drinking the rest of the box.

Holiday grocery store teas tried: 8/19